It is known that the normal operation of a printing press requires inking and cleaning. The proper cleaning of the printing press is critical to efficient operation of the printing press, and effective cleaning is extremely important when it comes to anilox rolls. The amount of ink transferred to the anilox roller is dependent upon the anilox cell volume, and therefore, an anilox roller with plugged cells will deliver reduced amounts of ink, resulting in diminished print quality.
According to one typical cleaning technique, a printing press is stopped and the anilox roll is removed and cleaned by hand. As is known, in some circumstances this technique may result in lost productivity, potential injury to the environment, increased hazard exposure to workers, and oftentimes, inferior cleaning. Some examples of hand cleaning techniques include chemical washes, media blasts, baking soda and cryogenic systems, ultrasonic cleaning, and laser cleaning.
In yet another cleaning technique, the printing press is stopped and the anilox roll may be cleaned by hand while still on the press. Again, by utilizing manual cleaning methods to clean the roll, lost productivity, and potential injury to the environment and to the workers who must enter the hazardous printing may result.
Therefore, it is desirable to provide a system for delivering and flushing ink in a printing press to offer the capability to avoid cleaning the press by hand. In this way, a press operator may possibly avoid potential press downtime as well as exposure to injury to both the environment and workers.